Cookie Notice
Last updated 27 August 2026
The short version. This site sets one cookie, and its only job is to remember whether you accepted or rejected cookies so the bar stops asking.
There are no advertising cookies and no third-party trackers. We do count visits, but with our own software, which sets nothing on your device.
What a cookie is
A cookie is a small piece of text a website asks your browser to keep and hand back on your next visit. It's how a site remembers something about you between page loads. Local storage does much the same job with a different mechanism; where this notice says "cookie", treat it as covering both.
What this site actually sets
| Name | Type | Lifetime | Purpose |
|---|---|---|---|
lotic_cookie_consent |
Cookie, first-party | 1 year | Records the choice you made in the consent bar, so we don't ask on every page. |
lotic.cookieConsent.v1 |
Local storage, first-party | Until cleared | The same choice, in more detail — which categories you allowed and when. |
That is the complete list — two entries, holding the same answer to the same question. Both are strictly necessary in the sense that matters: without them the site would ask you that question on every page, forever.
What this site doesn't set
Worth stating plainly, because it's unusual enough to be worth checking:
- No advertising or retargeting cookies. We don't run ads and we don't feed any ad network.
- No third-party analytics. No Google Analytics, no Meta pixel, no Hotjar, nothing of that kind.
- No social media trackers. There are no embedded widgets that phone home.
- No cross-site tracking of any kind. Nothing here follows you to another website.
How we count visits without cookies
We do want to know whether anyone is reading the site — that's a fair thing for us to know, and you'd expect it. We do it with software running on our own server rather than an analytics vendor's script.
When you load a page, it records the path you asked for, the domain that linked you (if any), whether you're on a phone or a larger screen, and a scrambled one-way value derived from your IP address, your browser and today's date. That value lets us tell one person reading five pages apart from five people reading one — and because the date is baked into it, today's value and tomorrow's are unrelated and neither can be reversed back to you.
Nothing is written to your device, and nothing there identifies you. It's why this bit doesn't need your consent, and why turning cookies off doesn't turn it off — there's nothing to turn off. If that still isn't to your taste, most browsers' "do not track" and content-blocking settings will stop the request, and we won't work around them. The full detail is in the Privacy Policy.
The categories in the settings panel
The consent panel offers three categories. Being straight about it: only the first is in use today. The other two exist so that if we ever do add something that needs consent, it can be added switched off and this notice updated — rather than the categories being invented after the fact.
Necessary — always active
Required for the site to work at all: remembering your cookie choice, and the security and rate-limiting measures behind the waitlist form. These can't be switched off.
Functional — none currently in use
Would cover cookies that remember preferences and display settings across visits.
Analytics — none currently in use
Would cover analytics cookies. As above, our current measurement uses no cookies at all, so this category currently controls nothing.
Changing your mind
Open Cookie Settings — the same link sits in the footer of every page — and change the toggles. Your new choice takes effect immediately.
You can also clear or block cookies in your browser's settings. If you clear them, the consent bar will ask again on your next visit, because the record of your answer is the very thing that was cleared.
Changes to this notice
If we add anything that sets a cookie, this page gets updated and the date at the top changes before it goes live — not after.
Contact
Questions: admin@lotic.sh.